I was looking through the CRM tool at my new company today and picked up a prospect account – we’ll call it Bob’s Construction and Leasing. While reviewing the notes for Bob’s, I realized that this account had been repeatedly called on by 4 different reps for the past year and a half – none of which had gotten a single call back. There were no alternate forms of contact (email etc). Right then and there I saw this for what it really was – a Voicemail Vortex.

You may be familiar with the term, or you may not. But you are certainly familiar with the little “delete” key on your own phone. It’s the one you keep your finger on when entering into your voicemail box so you can listen to as little of the message as possible and get on with being productive. Voicemails are like an intrusion on your day. And guess what – the people you are cold calling feel the exact same way.

So back to my situation. After careful pondering, I decided to give it the old college try and dialed the number. Of course – voicemail. I left a brief, polite message and went back to the drawing boards. If this guy won’t answer his voicemail, what can I do to get his attention?

I decided a brief, cheeky email may be the solution to my problem:

Hey Mike,

I hope your Monday is going great. I wanted to shoot you a quick and candid email to follow-up on the voicemail that I just left you. I know you have been left messages by Cogent reps before, and I also know that you have not had your interest piqued to the point that you would return those calls.

Look, I know it is not your first priority to respond to cold calls. They aren’t very fun on either end of the line to be honest. But what I have to offer you could drastically improve the efficiency of your wide area network. Cogent specializes in increasing our clients’ bandwidth while decreasing the overall cost of the network.

Could we possibly schedule a call in the next week to determine how Cogent could be of value to Bob’s Construction and Leasing?

Take Care,

Tara Wagner

Within 5 minutes I had his response in my inbox as well as 2 other contacts from his company that I should be talking to. Moral of the story – don’t waste your time leaving voicemails when you know the client won’t listen to them.